The Review 2016

Asia’s Global University, The Next Decade: Our Vision for 2016–2025 is a statement of the University’s ambitions. HKU is unique in having a strong international focus with a distinct Asian perspective, and there is much room for advancing our global profile further. The pursuit of partnerships and collaborations with public and private partners around the world will be a central activity in the coming decade. We also will be more ambitious in our academic goals, particularly when it comes to translating our knowledge and capabilities into impact. Both students and staff are being encouraged to pursue innovative and interdisciplinary directions, and plough new ground. The 2016–2025 blueprint outlines how we will achieve these aims, centred around the ‘3+1 Is’ – internationalisation, innovation and interdisciplinarity, all converging on impact. This strategic approach will ensure HKU, already one of the world’s finest universities, remains a strong, vibrant and relevant leader in the global academic community, today and for the foreseeable future. Internationalisation HKU is already one of the world’s most international universities. In the 2016 Times Higher Education rankings, it scored 99.4 out of 100 on the measure ’international outlook’. The University regards this not as an endpoint but an excellent platform from which to create education, research and cultural opportunities for students to become global leaders, professionals and thinkers, to amplify our global engagement with public and private partners, and to diversify our portfolio internationally and on campus. This will in turn strengthen HKU’s ability to tackle grand challenges such as the United Nations sustainable development goals and through that, find solutions to serve local Hong Kong challenges. A number of activities are happening on campus to support our aims. Here briefly are some recent highlights, which are reported in detail elsewhere in this Review : • HKU Horizons, launched in 2015–16 to provide every undergraduate with an opportunity for meaningful learning experiences both in Mainland China and overseas by 2022; half of all students will do so by 2019. • Formal agreements with the University of Chicago, the University of Sydney, University College London and King’s College London in 2016 that will result in cross-disciplinary research and collaboration, teaching and learning opportunities such as training and exchanges, joint-teaching or dual degrees, joint conferences and workshops, and partnership on projects that address pressing global issues (HKU and Sydney scholars have already published more than 350 joint research papers since 2011, and HKU and UCL more than 150 just in 2015). • The inaugural symposium of the Zhejiang Institute of Research and Innovation, which provides a strategic research base for HKU in the Yangtze River Delta. ASIA’S GLOBAL UNIVERSITY 11 Students of different nationalities learn about each other’s countries and lifestyles at the Cultural Exchange Bazaar, October 2016. 10 Opportunities in Ethiopia HKU aims to expand its students’ horizons by providing every undergraduate with opportunities for overseas learning experiences. Overseas visits this year included a field trip to Ethiopia jointly organised by two sections of the Faculty of Arts (African Studies and Linguistics). The 19 participants worked with students and professors of four Ethiopian universities on academic projects and also visited the ancient capital cities of Axum, Gondar and Lalibella.